JP2525733B2 - Method of treating cereal crop seeds with chitosan to enhance yield, root growth and stem strength - Google Patents

Description

Description: FIELD OF THE INVENTION The present invention produces edible starch vinegar and produces elongated leaf blades (bl).
ade) and a method for treating seeds of cereal crops classified as Braminae. Wheat, barley, oats, rye and rice belong to the cereal crops.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION One of the key problems during the growth of cereal crops is the lack of mechanical recovery of fertile plant heads during harvest, resulting in plant Iodging prior to harvest. Researchers have tried to solve this problem from various angles. For example: 1. Obtain a variety with a stronger stem by breeding.

2. Prevent root rot by chemical treatment with benzimidazole type fungicide (Benlate).

3. Delay the sowing period of overwintering crops to shorten the period in which root rot is caused by microorganisms before the winter long-term growth period as much as possible.

4. Do little or no cultivated soil to leave crop debris to control soil erosion, which is likely to occur when the sowing time is delayed.

All of the above treatments partially solve the problem of reduced yield. However, each treatment has serious drawbacks.

Fertile plant heads exert extraordinarily severe stresses on plant stems, so other desirable agronomical properties, such as cold tolerance, in varieties modified to have stronger stems,
It was impossible to maintain milling suitability, harvest rate, disease resistance, etc. at the same time.

A fungicide composed of a derivative of methyl 1- (butylcarbamoyl) -2-benzimidazole carbamate (Benlate) can suppress the stem. This chemical can suppress the occurrence of root rot and maintain the initial stem strength. However, when this drug is used for a long period of time, fungal pathogens resistant to the bactericidal effect are selected, and the effect is significantly reduced. Also, because this drug may have side effects, Food a
nd Drag Administration grants permission to use this drug on wheat only in an emergency. Lastly, treatment with this chemical is extremely costly.

Even if the sowing time is delayed, the fallen stem is suppressed. In this case, however, there is no time for the plants to grow into large seedlings necessary for ground cover before the onset of winter rainfall and indeterminate snow melting, which erodes large amounts of soil each year. Erosion can be suppressed to a certain extent by using the minimum amount of cultivating work that leaves the stems above the soil during sowing. However, minimizing cultivating work generally reduces yields and leaves uncultivated weeds, necessitating the application of additional herbicides and pesticides, which requires expensive machinery.

Therefore, there is a need for a method that enhances stalk strength and root growth of cereal crops while maintaining or increasing yield at a commercially profitable cost.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION The present invention strengthens the stems of cereal crops such as wheat, oats, barley, rye and rice, helps maintain their water capacity, and significantly suppresses stalks (falls of plants before harvest). Therefore, we propose a new seed treatment with chitosan that increases the yield. Overwintering crops need to be sown early to cover the ground before winter rains that erode soil,
The problem of fallen stems is extremely serious for this type of crop.
Using the seed treatment method of the present invention, farmers can sow crops early and can reduce erosion losses of greater than 9071.8 kg / 0.4047 ha in certain areas of the United States.

Although the invention can be used with any cereal crop, the main experiments were carried out on wheat, barley and oats. Therefore, in the present specification, the present invention will be described by using these grains as specific examples.

The problem of inferior stems in fertile cereal crops can be solved by seed treatment with the naturally occurring carbohydrate chitosan. Commercially available chitosan, when applied to cereal seeds in the form of an aqueous solution, markedly promoted the growth of the root system of plants under field conditions and significantly increased the stem diameter, as well as the above and other intangible morphological and biochemical Increase yield with development. Chitosan-treated plants show superior erosion control, inversion resistance and increased yield compared to untreated plants. As a treatment method, chitosan collected from various carapaces of crab, lobster, shalimp and other marine organisms is directly applied to wheat seeds before sowing in the form of an almost neutral aqueous solution.

Therefore, the main object of the present invention is to provide a method for enhancing the stem strength and root growth of cereal crops while at the same time increasing the yield.

The above and other objects and advantages of the invention will be apparent to those skilled in the art from the following detailed description of the preferred embodiments.

Preferred Embodiment Chitosan is a macromolecule composed of a hexososamine sugar (glucosamine), the molecule of which may be linked (1 → 4) in a chain and have a molecular weight of more than 1,000,000. Chitosan compounds with molecular weights in the range of close to or above 1 × 10 ⁶ are commercially produced from Chichi. Chitin, an aminocellulose derivative, is the second most abundant naturally occurring polymer present in, for example, the fungal cell wall, bovine cartilage tissue and the rigid exoskeleton of insects and crustaceans. Waste from the marine food industry such as shrimp, lobster and crab
Contains 10-30% chitin. Chitosan is produced by deacetylation of chitin. The present invention provides deacetylation of about 90
It is effective above 100% and extremely effective when deacetylation is close to 100%.

Suitable starting materials are dried chitosan in flakes, granules or powders. The more finely dispersed the chitosan, the more quickly it will dissolve in a dilute aqueous acid solution (eg 1% acetic acid, or dilute hydrochloric acid, dilute sulfuric acid or dilute formic acid).

An appropriate amount of chitosan for a 64.75 ha (half mile square) wheat field can typically be mixed as follows. 1.089 kg
Crab carapace chitosan is dissolved in 30.28 1% acetic acid.
Dissolve the chitosan by maintaining it at room temperature for 48 hours with stirring. Then H ₂ O is added to bring the volume to 98.42 or the viscosity is reduced to the point where it can be sprayed from a dispenser of a commercial seed processor. (The chitosan aqueous solution can be used in most seed treatment machines that perform water-based seed treatment.)
Neutralize to pH 6.0-6.5 with 6.0 N NaOH 0.757-0.871. Add chitosan slowly with stirring as chitosan precipitates if the pH changes locally above pH 7.0. When approximately neutral, water is added up to about 98.42 to reduce the viscosity of the opaque aqueous chitosan preparation to the expected value. This preparation is added at a rate of about 0.473 per bushel of wheat seed (1 bu. = 27.22 kg). The amount of this aqueous chitosan is 2
Increase the moisture content of 7.22 kg wheat seed by 1.6%.

It was found that the chitosan resin treatment is effective when used at a ratio of 60 to 1000 µg of chitosan per 1 g of wheat seeds. Best results were obtained with 250 μg chitosan per gram wheat seed. This corresponds to 0.00635 kg of chitosan per 27.22 kg (bu.) Of wheat seed. In many areas, the average seeding rate of wheat is 27.22kg / 0.4047ha.

For barley, about 60 μg / g of barley seed gives the best results. For oats, 475 per g of oats seeds
Similar results are obtained in the range of μg to 525 μg.

The natural chitosan required for seed pretreatment is inexpensive. In the case of autumn wheat, the chitosan treated wheat seeds are sown at the end of summer or in August when water is available. Chitosan treatment increases stem diameter by about 10%.
Growing plants treated with chitosan in soil severely infected with root rot tends to cause some root rot symptoms such as discoloration of the stem and white head, but treatment with chitosan causes the stem diameter to increase and the root system to expand. As a result, the stem is strong and the vascular system of the stem maintains proper water transport capacity. Seed treatment with this naturally occurring compound results in low yields of 10-30%
Increased, soil erosion is minimized, and chitosan is easily degraded to simple amino sugar residues and / or metabolized by soil microorganisms.

Plants and microorganisms include chitosanase and other degrading enzymes capable of breaking down chitosan into smaller fragments and optionally into hexosamine that can be utilized as nutrients by soil microflora.

When seeds are treated in a lubricated environment, it is necessary to add a post-treatment drying step to reduce the water content of the treated kernels in the range of 10-14% to prevent early germination of the seeds. Therefore, the higher the viscosity of the chitosan preparation, the less the need for drying. The highly viscous chitosan preparation can be mixed with the seeds using any commercially available machine used for cement mixing. In addition, sowing equipment (gr) is added so that chitosan can be added to the seeds loaded in the truck immediately before being brought to the field for sowing.
It is also possible to modify the ain angering device).
In this case, extensive drying to prevent seed germination is not necessary.

The application of chitosan to seeds is not adversely affected by topdressing, herbicide application or irrigation programs. Other commercially available seed treatment materials such as insecticides and fungicides may be applied prior to chitosan. Ingredients already present on the seed are attached to the seed by chitosan, which leaves a "cellophane-like" surface on the seed after drying. Chitosan-treated seeds are sown directly by any commercially available seeder. fertilizer,
It is also possible to treat the seeds with chitosan during sowing using a special seed sowing machine that automatically administers soil fungicides, herbicides and the like. Tritium-labeled chitosan added to seeds, [
³ H] -Chitosan translocated during plant development, indicating that most of the drug was systemically distributed.

Dry chitosan can be stored indefinitely at room temperature without loss of biochemical activity. Chitosan can be mixed at room temperature as described above. Since the toxicity of chitosan is not known at all, it can be added to the therapeutic diet of animals without causing harmful side effects. The physical irritation of chitosan has not been studied for a long time. Therefore, or nevertheless, the use of chitosan requires the same basic considerations as those for handling other fibrous materials or powders such as cotton fibers or powders.

The effects of root growth enhancement, stem diameter increase and stem strengthening by chitosan seed treatment are observed in both early and late sowing winter crops. However, in the case of early sowing, a very advantageous erosion control effect is observed. This allows for the growth of large seedlings needed to cover the ground before the start of winter rainfall and snowmelt, and chitosan minimizes the problem of root rot.

The following data shows examples of improved properties obtained using the present invention with wheat, oats and barley.

Example 1. Growth promotion of seedlings Chitosan-treated Daws wheat seeds (using 200 μg chitosan / g seeds) were observed 4 months after sowing under circle irrigation (Washtuchna, Washington, October 1983 15).
Day).

Example 2. Inverted stem control Daws 'autumn sown wheat 1983 infested stems were read on the outer row of 4'x100' plots.

Example 3. Stem diameter increase The effect of chitosan seed treatment on stem diameter of mature Daws wheat 1983 was measured.

Example 4. Yield increase Daws Autumn wheat wheat The effect of chitosan seed treatment on 1983 yield was measured.

a-Yield is the average of 4 ridges. Section area is 1.22m x 9.1
4m. 60% or less of inverted stems in the control plot. At the time of harvest, the stalk wheat was also manually collected and included in the harvest amount.

Example 5. Increasing yield Example 6. Increased yield Example 7. Disease resistance enhancement Daws Wheat Psedocercosporella he of wheat stalks at harvest
The effect of chitosan seed treatment on rpotrichoides disease symptoms was measured.

Judgment of mature stem symptom Soundness = 0 Mild discoloration = 1 Speckled lesion = 2 Healing lesion = 3 Lesion collapse = 4 Example 8. Increased yield KAMIAK Barley autumn sowing seed Whitlow Farm, Pullman, Washington Average of 10 a sections (approximately 1.22m x 9.14m). Apply chitosan with water. An equal amount of water without chitosan was used for the control compartment. Average of b-2 section (approximately 1.22m x 9.14m).

Example 9. Increased yield CORRET oats spring sowing seeds Plant Pathology Farm, Pullman, Washington Average of 10 a sections (approximately 1.22m x 9.14m). Apply chitosan with water. An equal amount of water without chitosan was used for the control compartment. Average of b-2 section (approximately 1.22m x 9.14m).

Example 10. Wheat seedling weight Variety: VONA Harvest: December 18, 1985 Location: Alva, Oklahoma The application rate of chitosan solution is 0.473 per 45.36 kg of seeds.
The chitosan solution consists of 2% chitosan and 98% inactive ingredients.

Example 11 Wheat Seedling Test Data Seedling Crown Diameter Varieties: VONA Sowing: November 1, 1984 Harvest: January 5, 1985 Location: Alva, Oklahoma Example 12 1984-1985 VONA Wheat Yield Harvest: June 5, 1985 Location: Alva, Oklahoma, Example 12 1983-1984 TAM W-101 wheat yield Harvest: June 12, 1984 Location: Alva, Oklahoma Example 14 1985 Yield Comparison: Chitosan vs Benlate Location: Whitlow Farm, Pullman, Washington Example 15 1982-83 Stephens Wheat Harvest Example 16 1984-85 Daws Wheat Harvest Location: Whitlow Farm, Pullman, Wahington All values in the table are the average of four ridges of 3.048m x 0.356m.

Example 17 1984-1985 Hill'81 Wheat Harvest Location: Whitlow Farm, Pullman, Wahington Example 18 1985 Corret Spring Sour Oat Harvest Location: Whitlow Farm, Pullman, Wahington Example 19 1985-86 Boyer Barley Harvest Location: Soil Conservation Service Field Station, Pull
man, Washington Chitosan solution consists of 2% Chitosan and 98% inactive ingredients.

While the invention has been fully described above, it will be apparent to those skilled in the art that variations of the methods described herein are possible within the scope of the invention. Although examples have been given for wheat, oats and barley for reasons of clarity, the method is applicable to cereal crops in general. Therefore, it is to be understood that the scope of the present invention is limited only by the claims set forth by law.

 ─────────────────────────────────────────────────── ─── Continuation of the front page (56) References JP-A-51-76482 (JP, A) WHAT RESEARCH REVIEW FOR WASHINGTON WHONT COMMISSION, WASHINGTON OF OWN OF WHICH OF OWN OF WHICH OF THE WATCH OF WHICH DOES NOT BE OWN. , (Pullman, Washington), PP. 64-65. Washington, Sea Grant Program, 1985. Pullman Washingon) See Entire Document. Research Grant Prop osal, LA. Hadwiger, "Chitosan And Enhanced Wheat Yield. "

Claims (16)

(57) [Claims] 1. A method comprising the steps of applying an effective amount of chitosan produced by deacetylating chitin to the extent of more than 90% to a seed of wheat as an aqueous solution obtained by solubilizing chitosan in a dilute aqueous acid solution and then applying the solution to wheat seeds. A method of enhancing stem strength, stem diameter, and root development. 2. The acid of dilute aqueous chitosan solution is converted to acetic acid, hydrochloric acid,
The method according to claim 1, wherein the method is selected from the group consisting of sulfuric acid and formic acid. 3. The method according to claim 1, wherein the aqueous chitosan solution is neutralized to a pH of 7 or less. 4. The pH of an aqueous solution of chitosan dissolved is 6.0-6.5.
The method according to claim 3, wherein the neutralization is carried out. 5. A chitosan is applied to wheat seeds, and after drying, a cellophane-like surface is formed on the surface of the wheat seeds.
The described method. 6. The amount of chitosan applied is 60- / g of wheat seeds.
The method according to claim 5, which is 1000 μg. 7. The amount of chitosan applied is 225 per 1 g of wheat seeds.
The method according to claim 6, wherein the amount is −275 μg. 8. The amount of chitosan applied is about 25 per 1 g of wheat seeds.
The method according to claim 7, which is 0 μg. 9. (1) Dissolving chitosan produced by deacetylating chitin to an extent exceeding 90% in a dilute aqueous acid solution to prepare an aqueous acid solution of chitosan, and (2) pH of the aqueous acid solution of chitosan. Is neutralized to 7 or less, (3) covering wheat seeds with a neutralized aqueous solution of chitosan,
And (4) drying the wheat seeds to create a cellophane-like surface of chitosan on the wheat seeds. 10. The amount of chitosan applied is 60 per 1 g of wheat seeds.
The method according to claim 9, which is -1000 µg. 11. A seed of a grain crop, which is treated by deacetylating chitin to an extent of more than 90% to produce chitosan, which was solubilized with a dilute aqueous acid solution, and then applied to the seed with an aqueous solution neutralized. 12. The seed of claim 11, wherein the cereal crop is wheat. 13. The seed of claim 11, wherein the cereal crop is barley. 14. The seed of claim 11, wherein the cereal crop is rye. 15. The oat grain crop is oats.
Seeds. 16. The seed of claim 11, wherein the cereal crop is rice.